No way to treat our domestic goddess
US authorities have been found guilty of offending Nigella Lawson.
How mean of the US authorities to turn back Nigella Lawson at Heathrow airport, just before boarding a flight to LA. It was especially shoddy, says Jenny McCartney in The Sunday Telegraph, to do it after she'd been through all the "horrible blur" of queuing for check-in, weighing luggage and going through security.
It isn't quite such a hardship if you travel first class. Still, as McCartney says, if a US official intended to bar Lawson from America on the apparent grounds that she has admitted taking drugs in the past, it would have been "polite" to inform her first.
And perhaps she could have been told why the former heroin addict Russell Brand, and the former crack-smoking Toronto mayor, Rob Ford, "do not seemingly pose a problem for entry to the US. Oh, and why Presidents Obama and Clinton, who have both admitted to past illegal drug use, should be freely allowed into the UK". I agree: I too would like to know the answers to these questions.
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Scotland: the Saudi of wind?
Alex Salmond, in his vision of a self-sustaining, independent future for Scotland, predicts that it will be "the Saudi Arabia of wind". What he means, as Dominic Lawson put it in theDaily Mail, is that "it can profitfrom its gales as the Saudis do from their crude oil".
As First Minister, Salmond has already encouraged the expansion of wind farms north of the border. Even if we leave aside the problems of relying on what even in Scotland is an intermittent power source, this policy is threatening to blight the tourism industry.
The Mountaineering Council of Scotland reports that two-thirds of the respondents in a survey believe the gigantic wind turbines are making Scotland "a less appealing place to visit". The same proportion indeed say they have already been put off "visiting or revisiting parts of Scotland", because of the ruination of itsnatural beauty.
Lawson says that a Scottish friend of his denounces this as "the second Highland clearances". The friend's point is that, as in the 18th and 19th centuries, rich landowners are the only beneficiaries of depopulation.
First time round it was because they owned the sheep which displaced the crofters. Now it's because they're the ones getting the subsidies for wind farms. "How odd that a Scots Nationalist should be responsible."
Seven a day? Forget it
A good rule of life is to be wary of medical experts. The latest advice eat a total of seven portions of fruit and veg a day, though ten portions would be even better fits the bill.
Have you ever met anyone who consumes that amount of veg every day? Only 30% of us manage five portions, says Rachel Johnson in The Mail on Sunday. And no wonder. It's an expensive, as well as a time-consuming, business.
"Most manage only two portions of fresh anything, so think how long it would take to shop for, prepare, and consume ten portions of fruit and vegetables."
Tabloid money: "Make them an offer they can't refuse"
"Ed Balls's relationship with Labour's election campaign co-ordinator Douglas Alexander is now in open turmoil over the party's tumbling poll ratings," says Ephraim Hardcastle in the Daily Mail.
"[Last week] a source said: They detest each other. It's like a dysfunctional family.' The pair once had to be dragged apart' by Tessa Jowell during a row. Why all the bitterness? Wee Dougie blames Balls for briefing journalists that he was responsible for bottling the botched 2007 election thatnever was'."
Baroness Doreen Lawrence is an incredible woman strong, brave and proof the human spirit is indefatigable, says Carole Malone in the Sunday Mirror. "But why did she let herself be talked into doing those awful new Leading Ladies M&S advertisements? I'm sure Marks' PR people sold it to her on the basis that it was all about inspirational women, blah, blah However, I don't think Doreen was convinced, because in every shot she looks embarrassed, uncomfortable and like she'd rather be anywhere other than lying propped up on her elbow in a grassy field in a jumper even my granny wouldn't wear."
"If Scotland leaves the UK, then it will be because the passionate, pro-independence Yes campaign of Alex Salmond just seemed to want it a lot more than the half-hearted pro-UK campaign of Alistair Darling, David Bowie and Kermit the Frog," says Tony Parsons in The Sun.
"But Scotland should not kid itself. The UK did not want to share a currency with the rest of Europe. And we would not want to share a currency with Alex Salmond."
"The Beverly House off Sunset Boulevard, where they filmed The Godfather scene involving the decapitated head of ahorse, is up for sale," says the Daily Mail's Ephraim Hardcastle. The house is priced at £81m. "But a local wit suggests: Make them an offer they can't refuse'."
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